Within the third of 4 ladies’s quarter-finals, reigning Olympic champions the Netherlands overcame a cussed Nice Britain facet to succeed in the Paris 2024 Olympic hockey semi-finals, with Lune Fokke scoring twice in a 3-1 victory over the Rio 2016 gold medallists.
The end result signifies that the Netherlands will face Argentina – who defeated Germany in a shoot-out earlier within the day – within the semi-finals on Wednesday (7 August), which is a repeat of the gold medal recreation from Tokyo 2020.
The Oranje exploded out of the blocks within the contest, with workforce captain Xan de Waard smashing dwelling from a decent angle after simply 49 seconds. Whereas it was the worst doable begin for GB, the Netherlands’ failure to press dwelling their benefit was punished early within the second quarter by Nice Britain’s Hannah French, who pounced on a penalty nook rebound to stage the scores.
Nonetheless, the Dutch restored their lead simply earlier than half time when Luna Fokke guided a penalty nook deflection into the online. The 23-year-old midfielder put the sport past Nice Britain’s attain a minute into the ultimate quarter, passing into an unguarded internet after GB goalkeeper Miriam Pritchard’s nice save fell immediately into Fokke’s path. It was a valiant effort from Nice Britain, however the Netherlands have been worthy winners, qualifying for the Olympic semi-finals for the eighth successive Video games.
“We actually wanted to combat onerous right now, I feel we defended fairly effectively”, stated Netherlands defender Renee van Laarhoven after the match. “When the 1-1 rating got here I feel we have been a bit unfortunate, however we knew we would have liked to defend tougher and provides extra vitality. After making it 2-1 we thought we have to push by now, in any other case this turns into an extended recreation. I’m very pleased we made it 3-1. It’s all concerning the outcomes, in these video games. I’m so pleased we go into the semi-finals, completely.”
Looking forward to their semi-final assembly with their nice rivals Argentina, Van Laarhoven stated: “I feel we at all times have nice, wonderful video games in opposition to Argentina. I imply, we all know they’ve a great deal of ardour. They provide it their all. We noticed it in opposition to Germany right now, once more. We at all times like to play in opposition to them, and I feel they like to play in opposition to us as effectively. It’s at all times an incredible combat. And, yeah, we will’t wait to maintain going.”
The hockey competitions on the Olympic Video games Paris 2024 happen from Saturday 27 July to Friday 9 August. Each the lads’s and ladies’s competitions characteristic 12 groups, break up into two swimming pools of six forward of quarter-finals, semi-finals and medal matches. For extra details about the hockey competitions at Paris 2024, go to Olympics.Hockey.
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